Friday, November 22, 2013

An engaged group of citizens met at Bellewood Acres in
Lynden last Wednesday evening to discuss a new project to voluntarily reduce
fecal coliform pollution in the Tenmile Creek watershed. The Tenmile
Creek Clean Water Project is being led by theRE Sources’ Baykeeper team and is funded by the Rose Foundation. Forty-two community members attended the
first meeting and many of them signed up to participate in a stakeholder group.

Why are we doing this?
Fecal coliform levels have been
increasing in many feeder streams in the Nooksack basin, and this effort is a
forward step by citizen stakeholders to work with watershed neighbors to reduce
fecal coliform levels on a voluntary basis. We decided to focus this effort in
the Tenmile area because of a past success there. About 10 years ago, Tenmile
Creek neighbor and co-owner of Bellewood Acres, Dorie Belisle, coordinated citizens
in the Tenmile Creek watershed as they participated in a voluntary project to
reduce levels of fecal coliform.. The
project was a success for several years, but the creek is once again in
decline.

High levels of fecal coliform in streams can cause disease, threaten
agricultural viability, including downstream shellfish harvesting operations
that Tribal and commercial communities rely upon. People can also get sick from contacting
water that is contaminated with fecal coliform. This trend is not unique to
Tenmile Creek.

Fecal coliform bacteria live in the intestinal tract of warm
blooded animals and originate from animal and human waste. In other words, the source is poop. Sources could include failing septic systems,
manure, birds, beavers, pet waste, and other sources. The Tenmile watershed includes Tenmile,
Fourmile, and Deer Creek. Within this
watershed are 2,642 on-site septic systems, 19 fields associated with dairies,
26 small farms, and populations of deer, waterfowl, beavers, and other wild
animals. What is the source of the
poop? Nobody knows for sure, but we’re
going to do our best to find out where it’s coming from and which sources are
the greatest contributors. This project is like solving a puzzle.

After the first meeting, 20 neighbors joined us for a second
meeting to start crafting solutions to the fecal coliform problem in Tenmile Creek.
This stakeholder committee will work closely with RE Sources’ Baykeeper team,
identifying sources of contamination and considering voluntary solutions to
improve the quality of the creek. All meetings of this group are open to the
public and community members concerned about their watershed are encouraged to
attend.

This first meeting of the stakeholder committee brought
about a number of questions that the Baykeeper Team will work hard to address before
the next meeting: Should we test for additional
water quality parameters? Should we
measure stream flow while we’re out there? How do fecal coliform levels in
Tenmile compare with pristine streams? What effect does sunlight, algae, and
decaying leaves have on fecal coliform levels? How many samples should we
collect? Should we take samples during storm events too? What influence does Deer Creek have on fecal
coliform levels in Tenmile Creek? Answers to these questions should become
clearer as the project evolves.

If you’re curious about this project, you are welcomed to
attend the next meeting, which is on Wednesday, December 11th at
Bellewood Acres. To learn more about the project, visit www.re-sources.org.